Lucas County IA Archives Biographies.....Butts, Lucien A. 1825 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com December 14, 2007, 8:37 pm

Author: Cyrus C. Carpenter (1896)

LUCIEN A. BUTTS, who has long been a resident of Lucas county, was born in
Allegany county, New York, June 8, 1825, a son of Martin and Lydia (Church)
Butts. Nathaniel Butts, grandfather of our subject, was a native of Connecticut,
descended from one of three brothers from England, who settled in that colony
before the Revolution. Seven of one family of the descendants served together in
the Revolutionary war. Nathaniel Butts emigrated to Vermont, where he resided
until his death. Martin, the eldest of his nine children (six sons and three
daughters) and the father of our subject, was born in Vermont in 1798. When
sixteen }'ears of age he started out in life for himself, working his way in
various employments as far as western Pennsylvania, where he supplemented his
scanty common-school education at Meadville Academy. He settled in Allegany
county, New York, about 1822, and engaged in lumbering and mercantile pursuits,
and finally in farming. He was also a teacher and surveyor. In his political
relations Martin Butts was an old-line Whig, and besides other official
positions was elected State Senator from his district for the term of 1854-5. He
was a stanch Republican after the organization of that party, and one of the New
York Electors for General Grant's last term. He was a plain, unassuming
Christian gentleman, prominent in the Baptist Church, and useful and respected
in all the walks of life. He was married in Allegany county, New York, to Miss
Lydia Church, one of a New England family settled there. They had two children:
Lucien A., the subject of this sketch; and DeWitt C., who was a farmer, and died
in Allegany county, in 1861. The mother of these children died when Lucien A.
was four years old. The father afterward married Miss Mandana Church, by whom he
had four sons and two daughters. William O., the eldest of these sons, has been
a teacher, civil engineer and farmer, living in Ohio, West Virginia and now in
New York; Joshua T., deceased January 30, 1869, was for some time on the staff
of the New York Herald, and at the time of his death law editor of that paper;
Martin N. and Albert are together on the old farm in Allegany county; Lydia, the
first daughter, died in infancy; and Frances A. is wife of Rev. R. A. Waterbury,
Ph. D., vice-principal of the State Normal School at Geneseo, New York, and a
Baptist minister. Martin Butts died and was buried at Friendship, Allegany
county, in 1876, and Mrs. Mandana Butts died and was buried at Geneseo, New
York, in 1890.

   Lucien A. Butts, the subject of this sketch, received his education in the
common schools of his county, except ten weeks in Alfred Academy. When fourteen
years of age he was employed as clerk in a store at Cuba, New York, serving two
years. The winter after he was seventeen he taught school, and also the winter
following. His former employer having died that winter, on close of his school,
Mr. Butts was recalled by the father of the deceased, to take charge of the
store, which, when nineteen years of age, he bought and continued until 1857. At
the opening of the late war he enlisted in Company K, Eighty-fifth New York
Infantry, and was engaged in recruiting, with rendezvous at Elmira, New York. In
December, 1861, he received a commission as Second Lieutenant, joining his
regiment at Washington, District of Columbia, in January, 1862. Here the winter
was spent in camp of instruction. April 1 of that year the regiment landed at
Fortress Monroe, as part of McClellan's army for the Chickahominy campaign.
Following the rebel retreat from Yorktown, his regiment was in support at the
battle of Williamsburg. At Seven Pines the Eighty-fifth New York was in Casey's
division, which received the brunt of the rebel attack, being at the left of the
Union line. In this fight Mr. Butts, then First Lieutenant, being its only
officer present, commanded his company. Immediately after this battle Lieutenant
Butts was made Acting Regimental Quartermaster, serving as such about six
months. The Eighty-fifth New York was present during the Seven Days' Fight and
the retreat to Harrison's Landing, and when McClellan left the peninsula, as
part of Peck's division, was left at Newport News, moving from there to Suffolk,
and thence to Newbern, North Carolina, and from there went in Wessell's brigade,
on General Foster's raid, to Goldsboro. After the retreat it went into winter
quarters at Newbern. In March, 1863, the rebels attacked the camp of the
Ninety-second New York on the north shore of the Neuse, opposite Newborn, and
the Eighty-fifth New York crossed the river in lighters to reinforce them. After
taking part in the relief of Washington, North Carolina, which the rebels
besieged after their repulse at Newbern, Wessell's brigade was sent to garrison
Plymouth, North Carolina, where, in April, 1864, the whole command was captured.
As prisoners of war they were marched to Goldsboro, and sent by cars to
Anderson-ville, Georgia, where the enlisted men were put in the stockade and the
officers confined in an old church near by, and taken back to Macon next day,
May 1. Here the officers were confined until late in July, being then removed to
Savannah, and in August to Charleston, where they were under fire until early in
October, when on account of yellow fever among the guards they were removed to
Columbia, South Carolina, and confined until February 14, when they were taken
to Charlotte, North Carolina, from which place Lieutenant Butts with three
others escaped, February 16. His party, with another of four, who escaped the
same night, were recaptured at Fayetteville, North Carolina, March 2, and after
a week's confinement there were sent by way of Raleigh and Danville, Virginia,
to Richmond, arriving March 16, and were paroled from Libby prison, March 26,
1865, after over eleven months' experience as prisoners of war! Lieutenant Butts
was honorably discharged April 5, 1865, at Annapolis, Maryland, and was at
Washington for settlement of his accounts when President Lincoln was killed, and
again at the Grand Review.

   On his return home, Lieut. Butts (then commissioned Captain) was made
Postmaster of Cuba, New York, but resigned in the fall of 1866 and came West,
remaining at Ripon, Wisconsin, while deciding on a location. In September, 1867,
he removed to Russell, Lucas county, Iowa, where he had purchased a farm of
Romaine & Foster, which he held twenty-five years. He built the beautiful home
he now occupies in 1893.

   Mr. Butts cast his first presidential vote for I Zachary Taylor, and has been
a Republican since the formation of the party. He was a charter member of Frank
Nolan Post, G. A. R., and chosen its Commander for 1895. With his family, he is
a member of the Baptist Church.

   Mr. Butts was married, October 2, 1848, to Miss Margaret Young, born in
Herkimer county, New York, daughter of Henry and Gertrude (Snell) Young. The
ceremony was performed by Rev. Harris, of the Baptist Church. To this union have
been born four children, three being natives of New York, namely: Alice, now
wife of A, J. Woodman, a hardware merchant of Russell; Edward, born February 7,
1854, who is president and manager of the Edward Butts Manufacturing Company of
the city of Mexico; Charlotte A., at home; and Henry M., born at Russell,
October 1, 1870, is now with his brother in the city of Mexico.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

A MEMORIAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD OF IOWA

ILLUSTRATED

"A people that take no pride in the noble achievements of remote ancestors will
never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote
descendants."'—MACAULAY.

"Biography is by nature the must universally profitable, universally pleasant,
of all things."—CARLYLE

"History is only biography on a large scale"—LAMARTINE.

CHICAGO: THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
1896


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